We have seen this for the past 12 years and going, where back in Afghanistan, America has been and continues to supposedly be targeting Taliban for
over a decade, yet continues to attribute the soar in CIVILIAN deaths to increased Taliban firepower & stronghold... and likewise in other countries
it's since moved onto systematically attacking, no one to blame, but themselves.

Home of the "brave", how could you stoop so low? Even launching strikes at funerals.

Mass Assassinations Lie at the Heart of America's Military Strategy in the Muslim World

Greatly expanded U.S. military Special Ops teams, U.S. drone strikes and private espionage networks run by former CIA assassins create a threat to our
security.

"[General McChrystal says that for every innocent person you kill, you create 10 new enemies ." The truth that many Americans find hard to take is
that that mass U.S. assassination on a scale unequaled in world history lies at the heart of America's military strategy in the Muslim world, a
policy both illegal and never seriously debated by Congress or the American people.

I believe the term they used in South Vietnam was "Free Fire Zone". Anything moving, as I've read it, was open to shoot in some of the more extreme
cases of how that was acted on in the field. I thought the murder of civilians by deliberate action ended there. It's one thing to hear about
mistakes .... burn out induced bad judgement or just poor training in that video game environment of the drone cockpits ....

Follow up strikes on first responders and civilians running in AFTER the primary and intended target is hit? Well... I'm as American as Apple Pie and
George Washington people. Everyone here who knows me at all knows that first and FOREMOST. However, this is honest to God war crime territory for the
commanders who ordered it and then men in those flight sim trailers that sent the missiles into the masses of people.

Just what the hell is the difference (pardon my french) between this and a Jihadi terrorist blowing a Baghdad market and slaughtering 20 people?

Some may really get mad to hear me say this..but I can't help it. It's the TRUTH. I have MORE respect for the Jihadi. HE DIED for his beliefs.
However misguided or evil I may think they were in his mind. The drone pilot didn't risk more than a bad evaluation and could wander over and get
some Taco Bell or Burger King when the long day was done. Oh..this is ...un-American at a level which gives a whole new dark meaning to that term.

Ultimately, it is the fault of the American people......and they are the ones who pay the cash reparations, and the killers wages ......there is a
groundswell building, and they will refuse to support the psychopaths when enough of the truth gets to them.......
Obama.Bush, notice any difference?
The two party system shrunk down to a one party dog and pony romp......

Given the fact that the VAST majority of the drone war has happened under Obama? Yes... I do lay this directly at his feet. Bush came up with the
idea.... Obama is who made it the preferred and routine tactic of this war. The numbers don't lie and the numbers in this case are as dramatic a
display as anything.

There really should be a line drawn where the potential for collateral damage should cancel a mission until a better opportunity presents itself
(especially when the civilian "collateral" are women and children).

You're right. Bush did start the wars. Afghanistan never should have started ...since those the whole effort was meant to nail were all but cornered
by a CIA team leading Northern Alliance forces in the end of 2001. They asked for a blocking force to be dropped on the Pakistan border so the trap
could be closed. Kabul had already fallen and most of the country was in the process of it ...without anything more than that CIA team and some Green
Berets leading the local forces the U.S. had worked with in the 80's. (The OTHER ones the US worked with in the 80's.. lol). Bush's reply was to
thank them, wish them a Merry Christmas and tell them to stand down and leave. Immediately. .....the Marines landed in Kandahar, not the border for a
blocking force..and the war that never had to be was off and running.

Iraq was just flat out not justified at all...and I supported it in 2003. 100%. I assumed the Government MUST know more than we did. Had to. America
doesn't invade nations for nothing.. right? Err.... Wow... That was a HARD lesson late in life..

Bush is only 2nd in blame today because he isn't
the one holding office. Thats the only reason in my thinking......

On the drones tho? I mean, if we're specific to that as the topic? That was Obama...and I ALSO support drones as close air support to troops on the
ground or reconnaissance with the ability to fight if needed ... I just can't stomach the roving Hunter/Killer units they've become ...and yeah,.
that too did start under Bush. That tactic just seems to have become a science since. Obama isn't commanding these guys directly .. No. He COULD shut
this down with a stroke of a pen though..or radically redefine it. That is where the blame sits in his lap on it, IMO.

The use of military weapons to kill noncombatants is nothing new and yes it is a war crime yet never punished. Going back to WWII, it was simply
called strategic bombing. The claimed targets were industry and infrastructure but in truth they targeted the population so as to do what they called
'break their will to fight'.

This did not change during the Korean war, Vietnam or any other war/conflict since that time. The wanton slaughter of the civilian population is
nothing short of genocide, yet none are held accountable. Granted Obama has inherited the illegal Iraqi war and Afghanistan war but has not gone to
end them but simply to switch to the use of drones. While currently under his watch the US is in 50 different countries and multiple conflicts not
just Iraq and Afghanistan.

The majority of the causalities in these conflicts are noncombatants. Killing 20 civilians just to get 1 legitimate target is murder and a war crime
yet simply called collateral damage. The old excuse, I was just following orders doesn't pass muster. As long as the US population allows and condones
such activity it will continue

As in the movie The Last Mohican "...is your tomahawk not red enough...?"

Asked about the strike that killed him, a senior adviser to the president's campaign suggests he should've "had a more responsible
father."

He was the son of Anwar al-Awlaki, who was also born in America, who was also an American citizen, and who was killed by drone two weeks before
his son was, along with another American citizen named Samir Khan. Of course, both Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan were, at the very least, traitors to
their country -- they had both gone to Yemen and taken up with Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, and al-Awlaki had proven himself an expert inciter
of those with murderous designs against America and Americans: the rare man of words who could be said to have a body count. When he was killed, on
September 30, 2011, President Obama made a speech about it; a few months later, when the Obama administraton's public-relations campaign about its
embrace of what has come to be called "targeted killing" reached its climax in a front-page story in the New York Times that presented the President
of the United States as the last word in deciding who lives and who dies, he was quoted as saying that the decision to put Anwar al-Awlaki on the kill
list -- and then to kill him -- was "an easy one." But Abdulrahman al-Awlaki wasn't on an American kill list.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
I'm as American as Apple Pie and George Washington people. Everyone here who knows me at all knows that first and FOREMOST. However, this is honest
to God war crime territory for the commanders who ordered it and then men in those flight sim trailers that sent the missiles into the masses of
people.

It would indeed be a war crime, if we were actually accountable for them, check out this old thread of mine... Bush 'Unsigns' War Crimes Treaty
It's ok 'cause we're the good guys, the bad guys, aka the Axis of Evil are
practically beating down our doors at night.

Yes, but it wasnt Obama who started that war, and to be honest id much rather a drone be doing the hitting, instead of troops on the ground of men in
jets above.

I dont have an issue with drones being used, I have issues when they are used to murder civilians, but this isnt deliberate and, as everyones says
some collatoral damage is unfortunate.

But blaming Obama is like blaming truman for the war in Japan. He adopted it, and did what he could to finish it.

Id rather it was real combat soldiers than any drones. If you have the balls to kill citizens, children, innocents, don't hide behind video game
technology. See up close what you are doing. And if the soldier gets taken out by a 9 year old who grabs a weapon, um..........so be it!

War really really is pathetic, especially when its just set up by our leaders so their corporate friends can make a fortune while they enslave
minds.......but it should hurt the ones doing it.

Originally posted by sealing
Next presidents will have drones but with the laser
weapon currently attached to AC130's. Soon as that's
miniaturized, look out.

edit on 4-1-2013 by sealing because: more

There is no laser weapon mounted on AC-130s. There was a laser mounted on a C-130H that was tested, but it won't be mounted on anything because
it's too big. They may eventually mount them on AC-130s, but not for a long time.

"Agenda" absolutely.. that of his bankster puppetmaster and his own distorted wreckless persona (ex-gay ex-muslim ex-terrorist ex-barry etc)

past 12 yrs, his 8 yrs term (if not made permanent us dictator).. no difference!

what a way to ring in new year and 2nd term, launching missile at Syria, Pakistan, & already Turkey.. and *not* pulling out of Afghanistan, more
civilians are being killed than American soldiers committing suicide, that says a mouthful

America's blatant internationally ILLEGAL attacks on multiple countries, thousands of civilians from now on. permanent terror upon the world, forget
Osama & AlQaeda, oBAMA is the sum of all evils and terror! America masqueraded against.. but was and is - sheer global TERROR.

obama during his 1st term has already ordered more drone strikes than bush.. hundreds over each of many mideast countries, looks like thousands more
till all women children etc are DEAD

obama said: "I have 2 words for you: PREDATOR DRONES. YOU WILL NEVER SEE IT COMIN'!"

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